The stories and the parables the Jedi told always described life after death as tranquility. One was meant to feel everything in the galaxy, but also nothing. Connected to everything, but completely solitary. Floating in the abyss, at peace for all of eternity.
But when Ahsoka gained consciousness again she didn't feel balanced or at peace as she was always told she would. Actually, her body felt the same it had for her entire life. The only thing that was skewed was her connection to the force. It was strange, a strange she couldn't describe, but different.
She cracked open her eyes and was assaulted by a thousand colors, coming from some sort of light source. Perhaps not a star, but something glowing with the power of a thousand stars. Ahsoka lifted herself up, sensing grass beneath her feet. The gaping wound in her chest and all the other injuries she had sustained completely repaired. There was not a scratch on her.
Her eyes adjusted to the light and she saw an unfamiliar path standing before her. The place was beautiful, covered in trees and flowers, but unrecognizable. The sky was bright, but she could not see a light source. The grove reminded her of every wonderful place she had ever seen all rolled into one.
"Hello, Ahsoka."
She whipped around, automatically reaching for her lightsabers, only to find her belt empty. A woman stood under one of the trees. Memories stirred in Ahsoka's mind. A long forgotten adventure in a mysterious place that practically bled the Force.
"Daughter."
The Daughter smiled.
"I thought you were dead." Ahsoka said.
She laughed. "I am a being of the force. You saw my physical body die, but my spirit lives as long as the light side survives."
"But how long will it last." The Togruta commented bitterly.
"Oh, Ahsoka. The light side is as strong as it always had been. You just have to know where to look." The Daughter gestured towards the path. "Walk with me."
She hesitated but followed after her. "Anakin killed me."
The Daughter tilted her head. "Did he? Was it really him?"
Ahsoka considered it. "I guess not. It was the Sith in him? I don't think that it was really the man I knew, right?"
"Hmm." The Daughter hummed "Only you can answer that."
"But I am dead, right?"
She shrugged.
"That's not much help."
The Daughter's laugh filled the grove again. "I suppose not."
The pair grew quiet, relishing in the silence for a moment.
"How did it happen? Anakin turning to the Sith, I mean?" Ahsoka asked apprehensively.
The other woman sighed. "I have great respect for the Jedi, you know. And their dedication to the light side is admirable. They have protected your galaxy for thousands of years. But there was always one part of their code that I could never agree with. While every other part describes a choice, choosing one emotion over another, I never agreed with the rule against attachment.
"Attachment is not dark or light, but a tool to be used for either side, as versatile as your lightsabers. It is like any undeniable part of a being of the force, something that no matter what one must possess." She spoke fluidly, gazing at the trees as she walked. "It can be a weapon of the dark or of the light, like anything in the universe. It matters how you control it."
"Meaning?" Ahsoka asked.
"There is a difference between obsession and loyalty."
Ahsoka paused. "But love can lead to obsession."
"Can't everything?"
"Not as long as you can control it."
The Daughter smiled. "Now you get it."
"So attachment is not something that always leads to the dark side. I know this, I'm no longer a Jedi. I have attachments."
"Of course you do, all Jedi do."
"What?" Ahsoka said.
"That is the biggest hypocrisy of the Order. Jedi are expected to have loyalty to their masters and Padawans and friends, but not to be attached to them. But in fact loyalty is attachment, as true as obsession is. They are the same thing, but one falls in the light and one falls in the dark. The Jedi are taught that the Sith seek power, but do they not as well?" The Daughter questioned her.
"The Jedi seek power as a means to peace."
"And the Sith seek power as a means to chaos. The light and the dark are the same, two sides of the same coin."
"Like you and your brother." Ahsoka realized.
"Exactly."
"But what does this have to do with the Anakin?"
The Daughter gave her a look, "Patience, child. Now the Jedi are taught to use their power, their emotions, their intelligence, to the advantage of the Light Side when they could just as easily be used for the Dark Side. But not taught how to channel their natural attachments, only to ignore them.
"But attachment, to humans and objects alike, and all the emotions that come with them, are somewhat more important than the others. There are very few things in the universe more powerful than love. It is truly the only force strong enough to resist its foil, hatred.
"So how do the Jedi, and their devotion to destroying hatred, justify looking down upon the very nature of the Light Side. Love versus hate, obsession versus loyalty, manipulation versus support. Despite being at the center of the difference between the light and the dark, they are disregarded. If the Jedi are meant to be the protectors of the Light, then why do they criticize the core of it?
"That isn't to say that attachment isn't dangerous if influenced the wrong direction. But it is not necessarily more dangerous than other thing the Jedi use to their advantage. Every emotion one has can be tipped in the wrong direction. It can easily be warped and changed. Love can lead to the hatred of people trying to interfere with love. Knowledge can lead to an ignorance of other types of intelligence. Compassion can lead to the resentment of one who does not show the same amount of care.
"No matter what the Jedi cannot halt attachment, or even push it down. Just like intelligence or compassion or love, it demands to be recognized. It leads to living only a half-life, less than complete."
"Anakin never tried to ignore his attachment." Ahsoka said, having been listening intently to the Daughter's sermon. "He might never had said it, but he was obviously attached to Obi-wan and even Artoo."
She smiled. "And you. But yes, Skywalker was never one to ignore his emotions. But it was the fact that he was never taught by the Jedi to utilize his attachments, only to disregard them. Emotions are a dangerous thing, especially for force-users. They are powerful but easily influenced."
Something clicked. "So the Dark Side, or the emperor, or whoever turned Anakin, used his emotions, the ones he was never taught to control or speak about, to influence him." Ahsoka realized excitedly.
"Precisely. The man who calls himself Darth Sidious found his way into the very depths of your master's emotion and attachments and twisted them. He showed support for the feelings that the Jedi never wanted to be shown, forced Skywalker to think that there was no place for those emotions in the Light Side and only the Dark accepts them, when in reality it is exactly the opposite."
"So your saying that Anakin turning to Sith was the Jedi's fault. Or Obi-Wan's?"
"Never. Their aversion to attachment is understandable. It is somewhat more dangerous than any other condition. Master Kenobi did the best with what he was given, and he tried all he knew to keep Skywalker in the Light. But, whether he realizes this or not, his former apprentice was already too far gone when he allowed himself to notice the path that the boy was on. Kenobi was too clouded by the charade of detachment, as well as the toll of the war and the illusion set in place by the Dark side, to see it, as were the other Jedi."
The Daughter paused her steady stroll to pick a flower on the side of the path.
"Ma'am?" Ahsoka asked timidly, still processing all the information she was just exposed to.
"Yes, Ahsoka?"
"Was the…uhh…poisoning…of Anakin's attachment to me what drove him to the dark side?"
"Have you ever considered why your trial on Coruscant seemed so biased?" The Daughter asked, yet again ignoring Ahsoka's direct question.
"Ehhh…" She searched for an answer. "A bit, at the time I just blamed the war paranoia, but sometimes it seemed so deliberate."
The Daughter picked another flower. "It was. The Emperor, or I supposed the Chancellor at the time, tried his hardest to make sure you were killed, as an attempt to push your master further away from the Jedi. Even when you survived the plan worked in his favor. With your expulsion from the Order, Anakin found new distrust in the Jedi, however incorrect it was."
"So it was my fault." Ahsoka said quietly, imagining what her master must have felt when she walked down the steps of the Temple all those years ago. The pain and humiliation he must have felt at having his Padawan abandon him.
"It was not any one person's fault. Only the fault of the Sith. Some blame falls on the shoulders of the Jedi, yes, but they too were tricked by the Dark Side. Your actions may have contributed to Skywalker's fall from the Light, but they were not nearly the tipping point." The Daughter explained apathetically.
The pair grew quiet again. The being of the force found interest in another flower and started to tie the few she had collected in a small bouquet.
"As enlightening as this conversation is, what good does this really do me? I'm still dead. All of this is in the past, what's the point?" Ahsoka spoked up after a time.
"The balance of the force is a delicate one." Ahsoka sighed. Could she ever just get a simple answer? "And no one walks the line between the light and dark as closely as Anakin Skywalker, the Chosen One." The Daughter continued. "His is more susceptible to the influence of either side than any other being, even my father. Just like a coin is as likely to land on one side than it is to land on the other. Skywalker had the same aptitude to land in the Light than he had to land in the Dark. But that does not mean the winds cannot try to tip it the way they desire. The influence of the Dark outweighed the support of the Light, resulting in a dangerous consequence."
"I understand. "Ahsoka interrupting, starting to get irritable. "But the past cannot be changed! What is done is done, there is nothing I can do to change something that happened practically another life ago."
The Daughter faced her, smirking at the Togruta with knowing eyes.
Ahsoka's mouth hung open. "Is there?"
She turned down the path and started her stroll again, still smiling.
"Oh, come on! That's not an answer!" Ahsoka ran in front in of her. "Can I change the past or not? Can I change Anakin's destiny? Can I change my destiny?"
"Isn't that the question?" The Daughter replied simply. "It plagues us all, even me." She paused looking at the trees around them, almost lost in her own world. "We wonder that if we had done something differently would we have ended up somewhere else, or would the Universe have righted itself eventually." She sighed. "Or would it have ended up worse."
The Daughter looked her directly in the eyes and continued to walk. Ahsoka followed slowly, in a state of shock and confusion at what she was assumed The Daughter was trying to tell her. "I am giving you an opportunity that very few people have in their lives. I am allowing you to start over." The Daughter continued soberly, all the mischief from moments ago replaced with graveness. "But I must give you five warnings. The first is that even if the winds can tip a coin to land on one side or the other, it may ultimately land the way that it wants no matter what outside force acts upon it. Whatever you change it may be futile. Skywalker might be on a path he truly wants, and when a person is that determined there is little that can be done to change their minds."
Ahsoka shook her head, still dumbfounded that she was about to restart her life. "I know my master. He is a good person in his soul. He just made wrong choices."
The Daughter nodded. "It is interesting that you think that, because it corresponds with my next warning: If let this path run its course, Darth Vader will die as Anakin Skywalker. He will return to the Light Side for the last few moments of his life. There will be peace in the galaxy, eventually. If do not succeed in changing your future for the better, you may be risking that one."
The Togruta paused, conflicted. But the choice was simple really. "But I will still be saving all the lives he took. And I will succeed."
"The third warning is: you must not tell anyone of the first life you lived. You must not give any hint that you have lived this before. Sometimes knowing the future is the very thing that causes it to take place."
Ahsoka nodded solemnly, but her mind was really spinning with what she would do when she saw her master and all her friends again.
"The final and most important warning is: this is your only chance to rewrite history. You will not be given this opportunity to fix the past again. There are limitations to the power I possess, and I believe that after this we will know if Skywalker's destiny is set in stone."
"I understand." Ahsoka's voice cracked under the weight of her emotions.
They finally reached the ended of the long path at which rested a cliff. She couldn't tell what was beyond, but she wasn't sure she wanted to. At the top of the drop sat a beautiful courtyard.
The Daughter stopped when they reached the middle of the stone tiles and smiled at her. "Now, to when would you like to return? All the way to your birth? Or to the beginning of your apprenticeship?"
"Being born again would be too weird. And I don't think I have to go that far back to when I first met Anakin, but…" Ahsoka paused, still unsure. She glanced around at the courtyard and the design of the stones caught her eye. She was immediately reminded of the Jedi Temple and a memory flashed through her mind as clear as the day it took place.
Ahsoka sighed. "I know where to go."
The Daughter nodded, and she didn't even need to voice her decision. The woman placed a finger on her forehead and she was engulfed by a bright light.
"Ahsoka," An achingly familiar voice pulled from her reverie. The courtyard and The Daughter were gone, replaced by the walls of the Jedi Counsel room and the faces of the men she had once trusted more than anyone else.
"I am so sorry," Anakin Skywalker, her master said. "About everything." He looked exactly like she remembered from the war, not from her last memory of him in his black armor. His eyes were still bright blue and he still proudly wore Jedi robes. Obi-Wan stood in his usually placed next to his best friend, as official and kind as always. She couldn't respond, only nod, still disoriented from everything she had gone through in the last twenty-four hours.
"You have our most humble apologizes, little 'Soka." The first Jedi she ever met spoke up and she held back tears. "The Council was wrong to accuse you."
"You have shown such great strength and resilence in your struggle to prove your innocence." Master Saesee Tiin told her.
"This is the true sign of a Jedi Knight." Ki-Adi-Mundi said.
"This was actually your great trial." Master Windu spoke up. "Now we see that. We understand that the force works in mysterious ways, and because of this trial, you have become a greater Jedi than you would have otherwise."
This is what bothered her the first time around. The Jedi weren't admitting they were wrong, at least not Windu, they were saying that it was meant to be and that her suffering was for the better.
"Back into the Order, you may come." Master Yoda said, in his strange accent, bringing her straight back to the days of her childhood.
"They're asking you back, Ahsoka." Her master offered. His voice was as caring as she remembered, nothing like the monster that killed her. Anakin pulled her Padawan braid from his pocket. "I'm asking you back."
Incredibly, she hesitated, falling right back into the life she had lived before. He looked at her expectantly, like he was confused as to why she would ever not want to return as his apprentice. In actuality, she didn't immediately grab the braid because she was too afraid she would pass out from the storm raging in her head.
In the life before she closed Anakin's hand around the beads, but this time, carefully, she picked it from his hand and refastened it to her headdress, resting it in a place that felt right, even after all the years she lived without it.
The Jedi all around her, the faces of the dead and lost burned into her mind, smiled, fully alive.
Ahsoka Tano was not ready, but she had to be. The fate of her master, the fate of the Jedi, the fate of her friends, and the fate of the galaxy was in her hands.
She had to be ready.
Author's Note: So that was a long one with a lot of writing. All of the philosophy in that came from my brain so I don't really know if it makes any sense on paper. The Daughter and Mortis were seen in a three episode arc in Clone Wars and I'm nor sure if I interpreted it right but that's my idea of what she really was, like the physical embodiment of the Light Side. The dialogue at the bottom comes directly from Star Wars: The Clone Wars episode The Wrong Jedi, so that doesn't belong to me. Actually none of this belongs to me so I should probably be doing a disclaimer. Please don't expect them to be this long or updated this quickly. I had half written when I posted the first chapter and I was on a role. I'm terrible at plot pushers but good at explainers like this chapter, if that makes any sense. Please keep reviews kind. Forgive spelling and grammar and if it isn't exactly perfectly canon. Thank you.